Donald Trump’s Popularity Plummets as Fox News Agenda Comes Under Scrutiny
A recent survey conducted by Economist/YouGov has revealed that Donald Trump’s ratings continue to slide on most issues, with 51% of Americans believing the country is on the wrong track and only 45% having a favourable impression of his job as president. The poll, which was conducted from May 9-12, also showed that only 35% of Americans approve of his handling of inflation and prices.
According to a report by Alternet, Trump seems to be scoring particularly badly with young voters, with around 62% of young people (18 to 29s) having an unfavourable opinion of the president, compared with 53% of the over-65s. This comes as the Trump administration continues to pursue an agenda to close down or shackle much of the media it considers not on his side.
The Trump team clearly sees the role of the media as important to establishing and retaining support and has taken steps to shake up White House coverage – including by changing who can attend the White House press pool. As Alternet reports, about seven in ten members of the American public say they are following the news for updates on the Trump administration.
A recent survey conducted during the presidential contest last year, as reported by Alternet, showed that 57% of Americans had watched TV news in the previous 24 hours, with around 81% having used social media during the same period, but only 20% having used it to comment on politics. The survey also found that Fox News came out on top with 47% of the viewers, followed by ABC with 37%, and CBS and CNN tied on 35%.
As Alternet notes, Fox News is Trump’s favourite TV station, with its right-wing populist agenda and regular output of Trump-friendly news. The survey also found a strong connection between watching Fox News and Trump’s vote share, with the channel’s viewership varying from 21% in Vermont to 60% in West Virginia.
Using a regression model, Alternet found that the relationship between watching Fox News and voting for Trump is very strong at the state level, with the more time people spend watching the channel, the more likely they are to have voted for Trump. The model uses three variables to predict the results with 95% accuracy, including partisanship, ideology, and viewership of Fox News.
As Alternet reports, the most important predictor of being a Trump voter was the presence of conservatives in a state, followed by the percentage of registered Republicans, and the third was watching Fox News. A high score on all three meant greater support for Trump.
In contrast, a similar predictive model can be used to forecast former Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris’s vote shares by state, with four variables needed to predict the results with 95% accuracy – the percentage of registered Democrats, liberals and moderates in a state, and also Fox News viewership. As Alternet notes, the relationship between Fox News viewing and voting is strongly negative (correlation = -0.64), with high viewership corresponding to low Harris votes.
The article concludes that the US media is likely to play an important role in shaping public opinion and that the removal of the "fairness doctrine" in 1987 has led to an era of partisan broadcasting. As Alternet suggests, if the doctrine had not been removed, it is possible that Harris would have won the 2024 presidential election.
According to Paul Whiteley, Professor in the Department of Government at the University of Essex, "When the Trump era is over, incumbent Democrats are going to have to repair US institutions that this administration has damaged. If they want to do something about the polarisation of US politics, they may also need to restore the fairness doctrine."
This article is based on a report by Alternet and is republished under a Creative Commons license.
